The main trends in Christianity Nurqobilov Shahzod

A recently published comprehensive book – The Oxford handbook of Escha-

tology (Walls 2008) – conveys a clear sense of changes in approach: conventional

motifs such as heaven, hell, and millennialism are still present, but the striking

feature is the recognition of plurality in Biblical and confessional traditions as

well as the engagement with world religions. Particularly insightful is the extensive

discussion of fairly innovative perspectives such as, for example, eschatology and

politics, cosmology, epistemology, and the fine arts. Clearly, in the house of escha-

tology, it is not business as usual. The concluding chapter in this book by Bauckham

(2008) on ‘emerging issues’ is exceptionally informative. My own approach will

attempt to distil and systematise some of the shifts and add additional recent work.

Five major trends

In the following central section, five major trends in Christian eschatological dis-